Emily Pemberton is one of 15 UK 15-year-olds who launched the action/2015 movement to end extreme poverty.

After returning from my fact-finding mission on education in Ghana, I came to realise that many places and communities are being forgotten about, or the communication is poor. I wish to see the next government support other countries in fully tackling the Sustainable Development Goals (SDPs), to secure a better and brighter future for generations to come.

Of course, a key part of the SDPs is quality education, and I’ve witnessed first hand why it’s so important to everyone, not just people in developed countries. Watch my film here.

Even through learning vocational skills, many of the young women we visited at an ActionAid Young Urban Women’s Project in Accra are making a living for themselves through selling produce.

In the UK we’re lucky to have free quality education in every corner of the country, but that doesn’t mean our responsibility for helping other countries to strive towards an education system like ours is limited. I learned that regardless of being in a classroom, children and young people in Ghana are learning communication skills, citizenship, and women are even being empowered through some form of education.

World leaders have done an amazing job over the past 15 years – reducing the number of children not receiving an education from 110 million to 58 million is a milestone, but let’s aim for 0 children not in education.

I’m a Young Ambassador for the Send My Friend To School campaign, and I’m proud to be able to say I’m working with global contacts to learn and educate myself on these issues, because the issue of education is relevant to us all.

I urge world leaders and our next UK government to realise the significance of a child being able to write their own story.

Let’s stop taking our education system for granted and reach beyond our borders; to those not fortunate enough to be able to sit in a classroom, like me, like all of us.

By Emily Pemberton, 15 years old from Ysgol Gyfun Plasmawr in Cardiff, ambassador for action/2015 youth

#action2015youth

For more information on the action/2015 campaign and youth click here. The action/2015 Youth Panel is co-facilitated by British Youth Council, BOND, Islamic Relief, Progressio and Restless Development and Y Care International.